Lonmin strikers accept pay offer

Marikana - Striking miners at Lonmin's Marikana platinum accepted a company offer of a 22% overall pay increase to end more than five weeks of crippling and bloody industrial action.

Workers gathered at a soccer pitch near the Marikana mine cheered when they were informed of the 22% offer, and said they would return to work on Thursday.

"The workers are very happy with it [the wage offer] and so we believe that what has happened here has been a victory really for the workers, and they're going to work on Thursday morning," said Bishop Jo Seoka, South African Council of Churches president who brokered the talks between the miners and their employer.